Guitar Center Inc. Goes Private, Tools of Musical Rebellion Now to be Sold Exclusively by The Man, Bob Dylan Outraged, Jakob Dylan a Hack

Know how you HATE going into Guitar Center because you can’t pick up a goddamned thing without the ponytailed, tatted-up floor-rep who’s “only doing this as a day-job while his band looks for a new drummer so they can finish their demo in their other guitarist’s friend’s dad’s home-studio and send it to their bassist’s dad’s cousin’s boss because he works in A&R?” locking onto you like a fuckin’ heat-seeker (a rather carbuncular heat-seeker, mind you) and trying like Rocky Balboa to stick you with the biggest, most expensive sale that he possibly can??

Welp, Private Equity Firm Bain Capital Partners LLC must have made one scraggly salesman into the happiest Metallica fan since The Black Album when it waltzed into the mammoth maze of Marshal Amps and announced, amid the din of choppy, awkward “Brainstew” and “Come as You Are” riffs, that they’d take... EVERYTHING!

Yes, much to the surprise of... well... I don’t know who... business nerds who actually keep track of this kind of shit, I guess... anyway, much to the surprise of SOMEONE SOMEWHERE, the private firm purchased the entire musical instrument empire, known professionally as Guitar Center Inc., for roughly $1.9 billion plus assumed debt earlier last week (that debt presumably refers to all of those financed Flying V’s, China Cymbals, and Line 6 Amplifiers that haven’t been paid off yet). The total value of the transaction, expected to close in the fourth quarter, is approximately $2.1 billion, which the company will promptly put on its dad and step-mom’s MasterCard as soon as they provide Guitar Center with a phone number and zip code.

Under the terms of this deal (don’t worry; they have deals EVERY weekend), Guitar Center stockholders will receive $63 in cash per share, marking a 26% premium over its closing price this past Tuesday. Guitar Center shares were up 18.8% or $9.44 at $59.50 on the NASDAQ after hitting a high of $60.35 earlier in the session...

...zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...

HUH? WHA? Uh... oh yeah, and according to Billboard.com, as of March 31, the company had 30.17 million diluted shares outstanding, as reported in its first-quarter earnings report. In May, there was some talk ‘round the financial schoolyard that Guitar Center was exploring a possible sale. Once they realized they couldn’t sell to themselves because of the shitty deal they’d probably get on the trade-in, they hired an investment bank to explore strategic alternatives.

Credit Suisse Analyst Gary Balter said the company "seems like the perfect LBO." (Shhh! No dude, I don’t know what that means either. Just act cool...) "They have a dominant retail position in a high service business yet significantly under-earn other high service oriented retail segments," Balter wrote in a research note following Guitar Center's announcement.

Balter also added he would not be surprised if the company's Music & Arts division, specializing in band instruments for teachers, band directors, and students, is sold after the current deal is closed. But then again, one wonders if a man whose job is “Credit Suisse Analyst” is ever really surprised by anything.

But enough talk, kids. What does this all mean for YOU, the Guitar Center Consumer/St. Anger Enthusiast? Well, don’t worry, you’ll still hear all of those sweet radio ads, and you’ll still be able to get hustled into purchasing all of the kick-dick gear you need to get that gig opening for Finger 11. Sure, the music store might be privately owned by “The Man” now, but Rock ‘n’ Roll can NEVER DIE.

Texas' best sextet Okkervil River are back and going on tour this September in support of their fourth full-length release, The Stage Names, due August 7 on Jagjaguwar. The album was recorded in Austin with co-producer Brian Beattie, mixed by Jim Eno of Spoon at his studio Public Hi-Fi, and will be the first we've heard of Okkervil River since 2005's Black Sheep Boy.

The band will be turning 10 next year, and you're all invited to their birthday party. <3

The Stage Names tracklisting:

1. Our Life is Not a Movie or Maybe2. Unless It's Kicks3. A Hand to Take Hold of the Scene4. Savannah Smiles5. Plus Ones6. A Girl in Port7. You Can't Hold the Hand of a Rock and Roll Man8. Title Track9. John Allyn Smith Sails

English electro-pop duo Pet Shop Boys have finally crossed over into Stateside success and have charted at number 2 on the Hot 100 chart, riding the wave of their smash hit "Party Like a Rockstar." After 25 years of international acclaim but almost universal snubbing in the red, white, and blue spotlight, the seminal disco-dance group have struck gold with their raucous chorus and deadpan lyrics, "Party like a rockstar! (t-t-t-totally dude!)," accompanying somewhat of a musical paradigm shift. "Me and my band, man, on the yacht with Marilyn Manson. Gettin' a tan man," sings Neil Tennant in a cadence we've yet to hear on any of the band's nearly 30 albums.

...Wait, what? "Party Like A Rockstar" is the Shop Boyz?! Goddamn it!! Does a "z" really create a loophole in copyright law?

Anyway...

So, turns out U.S. audiences still don't give a shit, but the aged synth masters are still releasing a new DVD through Rhino entitled Pet Shop Boys: Cubism In Concert. I'm not quite sure what that means, but the disc takes concert footage from a November 14, 2006 show, live from Mexico City's Auditorio Nacional. If only for "West End Girls," the DVD is a must-have for all PSB completists, even if the band didn't get to open last week's BET Awards Live from the red carpet like their moniker-misappropriating counterparts. The DVD also contains commentary, interviews, and behind-the-scenes footage. Don't they all?

In accordance with the spirit of the free "77 Drummers" performance going on in Brooklyn on 07.07.07, along with the addition of a smattering of shows surrounding that date, we at TMT would like to highlight the 77 things in life that are more important (only slightly) than seeing Boredoms in concert at least once.

Seeing Boredoms in concert is only marginally less important than getting your doctorate, paying child support, returning mail to the post office that wasn't addressed to you, keeping a healthy diet, brushing your teeth after every meal, getting your cavities filled, seeing a doctor about your heart palpitations, running away from a group of skinheads holding guns, balancing your checkbook, saying you're sorry for euthanizing your friend's dog, letting your cat out of the cold garage, buying a return ticket for your trip to Oslo, keeping your social security number out of the hands of your convict ex-boyfriend/girlfriend, rearranging all your books in alphabetical order by genre, throwing out the trash to make the fruit flies in your kitchen travel elsewhere, keeping your margins justified when writing term papers on Edmund Burke, thinking of a good word that rhymes with zeitgeist, force-feeding a loved one Fig Newtons to keep them from telling you something important, watching the airline stewardess pretend to blow into the orange tubes in her floatation device, and printing your own money just to have a heaping pile of benjamins resting on the floor next to your bed.

As you can see, there aren't many events more important than seeing Boredoms. The only things more important to spend your money on are swing sets, saltwater taffy, charred laptop hard drives, not-overly-spotted-brown bananas, porkchops, swimming pools filled with foam squares, two-liter bottles filled with water that form tornados when swirled, functional Snoopy-shaped light switches, love letters written on bamboo paper, preschool macaroni art, expensive Super Nintendo cleaning kits, ripped book dust jackets, fuzzy hanging dice in cars, bellybutton lint of various colors, sweaty slices of cheddar cheese, computers that sing "Daisy Bell," the complete works of John Stuart Mill, waterlogged vacuum cleaners, hand-buzzers, and unintelligible vanity license plates.

SMOG 11:19 And the Lord God looked down on the traveler in the good and plentiful valley. Blessed art thou who goes forth in the valley of grapevines! Thou art the light of the world. Hi-fi production shall test thou in the valley, but thou shall defeat temptation and plant thy feet for love. Thou shall find fellow travelers Cat Power and Joanna Newsom in the valley, and strive to plant seeds in their gardens. Good traveler, do not be afraid when darkness befalls the valley of grapevines, for from Smog and darkness comes great light!

After two years, The Mae Shi have decided to announce a two-week tour. They'll be flying to the East Coast with their friends Yea Big and Kid Static, and they need YOU to help them book their tour! (If you can pay them $100, that is!) Really! Check it out:

As with all Mae Shi tours, we want to playliving rooms, basements, garages, office buildings and rooftops. Wewant to play your birthday parties and quinceañeras and bar mitzvahs.We are honoring our previous offer of playing your event for $100(although some restrictions apply -- see below). So if you'reinterested in hosting a Mae Shi show or can help us find a venue inyour area, contact us at [this address].

Their new album, HLLLYH, which will come out this fall on Moshi Moshi in Europe, doesn't have a U.S. release scheduled because, well, it doesn't have a label yet -- so if you know anyone who's interested, also shoot them a line about that.